


For Justice

by falsteloj



Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M, Sidekicks, Superheroes, Supervillains
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-30
Updated: 2017-04-30
Packaged: 2018-10-25 13:48:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10765497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falsteloj/pseuds/falsteloj
Summary: The moniker of Justice Lad was fine at 16. Now he was pushing 30 it didn't have quite the same ring to it.





	For Justice

**Author's Note:**

  * For [youtomyme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/youtomyme/gifts).



_The Red Devil made away with $1million worth of jewellery last night after Justice Lad found himself biting off more than he could chew. Or, perhaps it would be more truthful to say that he had already done the chewing. Our very own intrepid crime fighter attempted to gain access to the vault through a small service shaft, but had scarcely succeeded in getting halfway before realizing he was hopelessly stuck._

_It was down to the real heroes - the brave men and women of the city fire department - to save the day._

David threw the newspaper down in disgust. He didn’t know they had got hold of the story in the first place. The fire crew had sworn discretion, and the only other people on the scene were Charles and the Red Devil himself.

That was Nathan Danziger, editor of the City Globe for you. He’d pay anything for a scoop.

Double it for a chance to humiliate him.

It had all started when he was still new to the superhero game. Charles had just begun to loosen the apron strings, letting him try standing on his own two feet, and it hadn't been his fault that his feet happened to be a little wobbly after being accosted by a mutant gecko the size of a doberman. It hadn't been his fault, not really, that the closest thing to hold onto was Nathan Danziger's coat, nor that the man happened to be holding rather than wearing it.

The force of his shaken grasp had toppled Danziger over - straight down a stairwell and in to a painful few months with plaster casts and crutches. 

After that less than stellar start things had only gone from bad to worse, and now Danziger never missed an opportunity to make fun of him. His latest quest was ensuring the people of Metro City knew his commitment to green living and the future of transportation, the humble bicycle, wasn't enough to combat his expanding waistline. Wasn't the kind of thing that interested the city's youth either, and if David ever agreed with Danziger on anything it was that it was high time he ceased to be called Justice _Lad_.

Charles had no problem disagreeing with both of them. 

“All my sidekicks have been called Justice Lad,” Charles said reasonably, opening his own edition of the Globe with crisp movements. “Justice Lad and the American Dream. It’s what the public expects.”

David sniffed, trying not to act like a sulky teenager. Because the Justice Lad moniker had been all right back when he really could pull off the teenage angst. He had been 16 when he first donned the costume, and could scarcely imagine what he would be doing in a year’s time, let alone 13 of them.

Now he was pushing 30 and ‘Justice Lad’ was a constant source of amusement to the city’s media outlets. The new police chief had to choke back laughter every time they met, every time he gave a television interview, and Danziger took especial delight in cataloging the more ridiculous of his exploits.

The video of him chasing down a bank robber on a fortuitously placed child's bicycle had gone viral.

“When you get to my age,” Charles said, in his own clumsy attempt to be comforting, “you’ll realize just how young you really are.”

* * *

Sometimes David doubted whether he would ever reach Charles’ age.

Being Justice Lad was dangerous, sure, but not overly so. He wasn’t afraid that he was going to meet his end while fighting crime.

Instead it was the wider world that worried David. The pollution in the seas and the toxins being pumped into the air by big industry. He did what he could to lessen the burden on the planet. He cycled to work in both his guises, as Justice Lad, and as David Hartley, ward of Charles Leveson, chairman of LEV Inc and all around good egg. Even if he wasn’t as convinced by the environmental arguments.

Even if it had taken six years to convince him to go paperless, plus another three to convince him it was the right thing to stop handing out disposable plastic cutlery in the staff canteen.

It had been an unpopular decision, still was, and his punishment seemed to be having to attend every civic function the city had to offer.

There was a big gala fundraiser coming up, and Charles had announced three weeks previously that he was going to be out of town for the occasion. In truth he was being exceedingly reticent with the wheres and the whys, and it made David worry that there was some new villainy afoot. At least it did until Martha, their elderly housekeeper, let slip that Charles wasn't travelling alone and then he set to worrying about a whole new set of problems.

It wasn’t that David begrudged the man having a life of his own. It was just that these fundraisers invariably sucked. Boring speeches, boring small talk, boring food, and unless the criminal fraternity decided to attempt to pull off some spectacularly outlandish coup, he was going to be stuck there until at least midnight.

He took a cab to the event - it was a little chilly for the bike, after all - and nodded to a few people he recognized as he climbed the steps to the entrance lobby. It was a grand affair, hosted at one of the most beautiful buildings in the city, and the main hall was tastefully decorated with fabric swags and fairy lights. It put David in mind of a wedding reception, or even one of the Valentines’ dances he had attended in his teenage years. (Which, irrespective of what Nathan Danziger might have to say on the matter, were not concurrent with the reign of the dinosaurs.) 

Speaking of Nathan Danziger, David bit back a grimace at spotting the man seated across the room, scrolling through his cell phone with an air of insouciant boredom. The guy was such an arrogant creep.

Still, he didn’t have time to waste on negativity. He was there to represent Leveson Incorporated. So he smiled politely, nodded along to tales of golf and proposed amendments to city planning policy, and finally worked his way over to the board with the seating plan, seeking for his own position that evening.

His heart sank when he caught sight of his name.

It wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t fair.

He would sooner be seated next to the Red Devil for the evening.

* * *

A few nights later and he got his not so fervent wish.

The call came just as he was thinking of settling in for the evening, always a mistake in David’s experience, and he was still hopping into his left boot when Charles brought the (sadly still gas fuelled) car around.

At least they didn’t have far to go. A few minutes drive into the warehouse district, and there was the Red Devil, larger than life and directing a gaggle of henchmen to load what David thought to be some spectacularly ugly paintings in to the back of a lorry.

“Freeze!” Charles called out, cape fluttering dramatically in the breeze.

His own kept twisting at the back - a sure sign that Martha had removed the hand stitched weights last time she did the laundry, and forgotten to reinstate them. Martha was getting ever more forgetful lately.

“I’m rather busy tonight,” was the Red Devil’s response. “Why don’t you run along and play somewhere else?”

David wasn’t impressed. Yes, his bare knees might be on display, but that didn’t mean he appreciated being spoken to like a child. It gave him the extra push he needed to leap into the fray, mindful of the value of the artwork versus the throbbing in his own jaw when one of the goons snuck a lucky punch in. Charles was busy with his own assailants, and David thwacked in a blow that sent the big guy crumpling to the ground. He was just catching his breath when an arm grabbed him from behind, and in the tussle he felt his mask slip.

He tried to reach for the scrap of material. Attempted to duck his head and cover his face as best he could. But his arms were pinned too tightly, and when he chanced a glance up, the fabric of the mask somewhere around his chin, he swallowed thickly when his gaze locked with the Red Devil’s.

When he recognized the flash of surprise in the other man’s eyes.

Because it might only have been a domino mask but it had served him faithfully for over a decade. Nobody had previously come close to naming his secret identity, not to his knowledge, and now one silly assignment was going to ruin everything.

David elbowed the guy behind him, hid his face as best he could, and made a run for the nearest dark corner.

He thought of what Danziger had said about him earlier that week, when the dinner conversation drifted onto the antics of the city's sworn protectors. The dismissive tone of the older man's voice, and the way he had looked him full in the face as he spoke, as though he expected him to be in agreement. 

He was a walking disaster zone.

* * *

_Justice Lad’s not so secret identity._

_An inside source has revealed to us that Justice Lad’s real identity might not be as securely hidden as he thinks it is. In fact, Justice Lad has been well known to the inhabitants of the city in his alternative guise for a long time now. Longer even than he has been claiming the title of lad. If our source is correct in his hunch about the sidekick, we wonder if it’s only a matter of time before the identity of the American Dream becomes common knowledge. We can only hope it doesn't give their enemies too much leverage._

David glared at the copy. The last line was just the icing on the cake. Danziger was such a nasty piece of work.

“I don’t think you have anything to worry about,” Charles said sincerely. “They don’t seem to have a clue.”

David wasn’t going to stand for it, either way.

He wasn’t going to sit either, and he took his very functional thank you very much bicycle down to the newspaper offices.

Demanded to speak to Danziger, right there and right then, and was told that he was out on business. David refused to take no for an answer, or at least stuck it out at the desk giving everyone who passed a dirty look for ten minutes, and when the receptionist was busy signing for a parcel and flirting with the delivery guy, he snuck into the elevator and pressed the button for the top floor.

He stormed through the empty newsroom and knocked dramatically on the office door.

Except maybe the receptionist hadn’t been lying. The office really was deserted. He entered gingerly, just a little nervous.

The room was tidier than he’d imagined. The desk clearer. There were some proofs on it though and he felt his temper slipping at the sight of a spread featuring himself again, making fun of him foiling a villain’s escape on a conveniently abandoned skateboard.

He’d show Danziger just how childish he could be.

One wall of the office was covered in framed front pages. Big events, headlines that had shifted large numbers of newspapers, and right in the middle of it all was his very least favorite.

It was from a few years ago, maybe five now, and the Red Devil had succeeded in humiliating him thoroughly at the opening of the city water park. They had been staring each other down, gearing up for an explosive fight, when the Red Devil had struck a foot out, fast as lightening, and knocked his own feet out from under him.

Had sent him stumbling backwards towards the children’s paddling pool and he had teetered on the edge for one moment, two, before landing on his backside, surrounded by abandoned rubber rings and inflatable armbands.

That was the picture the City Globe had secured, of course. The look of bewildered shock on his face, and his uniform clinging soddenly to his body. Even his hair had been wet with the force of the splash, his bangs dripping all over his forehead.

If there was any front page David wanted to expunge from history, it was this one.

But when he lifted it down from its hook, not entirely sure on what he was planning to do with it - take it away, scrawl over it - it was to find a secret panel behind it.

Now that was intriguing.

It was a security system. Opened a safe maybe.

There was a full panel of numbers, but the key code was only four digits and David pulled a face at the implications. He could be there all day and still not manage to come up with the correct answer. Still he gave it a go. Went for the most obvious combination, 1234, and gingerly pressed the enter button. Who knew what kind of alarm the thing might be hooked up to?

ERR flashed across the screen but that was it. No flashing lights, no warning sirens.

It gave him the courage to try again. And again. And again. Finally he punched in the combination code for his bike lock, out of frustration, and nearly jumped out of his skin when the filing cabinet along the back wall swung away slightly.

David approached it carefully and peered into the dimly lit space behind it. It was a narrow stairwell leading downwards, like something out of the adventure comics he had grown up reading.

Like something out of the horror movies he had spent his teenage years having nightmares about.

This might not be the smartest idea. He went anyway.

The stairs were narrow and fairly steep, but not particularly long. He had only gone down one floor, two at the most, and then the steps gave way to a narrow passageway that led into another office. It was more of a lair really, lit with the blue glow of electronics that made the crate of jewels dumped on one of the desks twinkle and sparkle.

He recognized one of the lavishly set necklaces on the top of the pile as Lady Rianson’s missing heirloom. There were stashes of expensive artwork dumped about the place, including a larger than life statue of Charles that had been donated to the city at the beginning of his tenure as Justice Lad.

The curtain had been pulled back, the crowd bustling with anticipation, and in place of the American Dream was a statue of the Red Devil, cast in the famous thinking man’s pose.

His heart pounded. It was all too surreal.

A notice board took up most of one wall, covered in news clippings and ephemera. The Red Devil’s exploits, David supposed, except there seemed a greater focus on him and the American Dream. In fact, on closer inspection, the focus was chiefly on __him__. He recognized some of the pictures and knew that Charles had been cropped out of them. Others he had never seen before, though he knew, for the most part, the occasions on which they had been taken. There were a whole series of photographs from the water world opening and that made sense, if the goal was to revel in his humiliation.

Except maybe that wasn’t the point. The most prominent pictures were of him smiling. Him helping children. Him petting a puppy. All the best moments of being a superhero laid out for a supervillain to see.

He didn’t understand. Couldn’t make sense of it.

There was a scuffling noise approaching, footsteps on the stairs.

He had to get out of there. There was another door, leading down a narrow corridor. Through a final door and he was out into a regular hallway. The door clicked shut, locking automatically.

When he turned around it was to see a janitor closet sign on the door, a totally innocuous looking exit to a totally bizarre hideaway.  

What a day.

* * *

As the days formed a week David still didn’t know what to make of it.

Nathan Danziger and the Red Devil were one and the same. On the one hand it was obvious. That was where the paper got their inside knowledge. Why they always had the scoop first, and seemed to know so many details.

But, on the other, it just couldn’t be. He had spent plenty of time with both over the years and he had never once suspected.

Perhaps he simply wasn’t a very good detective. Maybe Danziger was right and it was time for him to hang up his Justice Lad cape for good. There were younger guys waiting to come through. Better guys. Guys with all the stealth and the range of movement he was starting to find eluding him, and guys who wouldn’t find giving up a few extra hours sleep knocking them for six the following morning.

But then there was the noticeboard.

Was it fair to hand over the title of Justice Lad to a newcomer when Danziger - the Red Devil - was so obviously obsessed with him. Would he transfer his interest to the newcomer? Would he even notice that the costume was being worn by somebody different?

For some reason the idea pained him. Danziger had always been the one person to see him before Charles. To care more about his activities than those of the American Dream, even if it was only for some weird devious reason of his own making, and perhaps he wouldn’t even realize that his tenure was over.

He was still puzzling it out when the call came through. It was the police requesting their assistance.

All thoughts of Danziger and the Red Devil would have to go on the back burner.

Police Commissioner Anderson was looking grim when they arrived. She had been tipped for greatness when he took up the mantle of Justice Lad. The rumour was that she was looking to trade in the force for politics full time, but for whatever reason it had never materialized and she had stagnated in the same position.

David sometimes mused that they had a lot in common.

Police Chief Keller, on the other hand, was new and full of fresh ideas. Didn’t agree with involving superheroes in confidential operations and wanted their involvement limited to photo opportunities and school visits.

Maybe it was time for things to change.

“This is a serious business,” Anderson said.

“Very serious,” Keller agreed.

“Of course,” Charles nodded.

David kept silent and waited for somebody to explain what exactly the business was, and then why it was so serious.

For his part, Charles was on top form, all solicitous concern and gentlemanly charm as he assured Anderson that they were ready and willing to solve whatever problem it was that had had Anderson calling for them.

“Nathan Danziger has gone missing,” she explained, “Nobody has seen or heard from him since yesterday afternoon, and his friends and colleagues all agree that it’s completely out of character for him not to leave a note if he is going to be missing from work.”

David thinned his lips rather than let anything show in his expression. Danziger must have had plenty of practice at finding excuses to be missing from the office.

Anderson went on, “David Henley, the ward of Charles Leveson - I’m sure you’ve heard of him - went to the offices yesterday, and the receptionist claims he was most insistent about wanting to talk to Danziger. Obviously we don’t think the Levesons had anything to do with it, but officers are on their way to manor now to interview him.”

He glanced at Charles, who raised an eyebrow at him. This could end up being awkward.

He hoped Martha was thinking quick on her feet today.  

“We just don’t know,” Anderson sighed, sounding exhausted. “Nothing to go on. He’s simply disappeared.”

Charles stood up straighter and took Anderon’s hand in his own as he pledged, “We’ve not always seen eye to eye, it’s true, but we’ll find him. Won’t we, Justice Lad?”

Keller looked sceptical. “We’ll be conducting our own investigation. Try not to interfere.”

* * *

Their first port of call was the newspaper offices. Charles tactfully said nothing as the recpetionist bemoaned his behavior from the day before, and David refused to be drawn on the topic as they rode the elevator to the top floor, not beyond confirmation that Danziger hadn’t been there.

They searched his office thoroughly, although not so thoroughly that Charles found the panel - for all that he smirked, helpless, at the photograph of him sat in the children’s paddling pool.

David kept up a silent debate over whether or not to confess all that he knew. It would help them find Danziger, would reveal so much vital information. But, at the same time, hadn’t they wanted to be free of the Red Devil for over a decade? If a supervillain had decided to go to ground and disappear, wasn’t it in their best interests that they simply let him?

Once Charles had deemed the newspaper offices to be clear of anything useful, they went to Danziger’s house. It was in a swanky part of town, and David couldn’t help note the number of expensive cars in the parking lots. He bet nobody cycled to work in this place, not unless it was for some vapid lifestyle photo shoot.

Inside however, it was completely different to anything David had imagined for Danziger.

He had always pictured him living somewhere all cold lines and minimalist. Ugly art pieces on the walls, and lots of glass and steel. The reality was that it was relatively modest. Warm, cosy, and as they pushed on in to the main living space a cat wound its way around his legs and let him scratch at its ears.

They searched each room looking for clues. Each room was surprisingly homely, lived in, and he took a moment to admire some of the landscapes on the wall. There were some of his own favorite books on the shelves lining the walls of the living space, and in the bedroom there was a framed photograph of a younger looking Danziger with a woman who had to be his mother, the editor who had brought the newspaper back from the edge of ruin.

It hit him somewhere square in the chest, the proof that Danziger - the Red Devil - wasn’t the cold villain he had spent so long painting him as. He was human, just like the rest of them, and had all the same faults and weaknesses.

They were going to find him, David thought with renewed determination. No matter where he was, or what he had got himself involved in, they would find Danziger. And, when they did, he and Danziger were going to talk it out.

The question was still whether or not to fill Charles in. Even if he did say it, would Charles believe him? He was pretty set in his ways, and even after seeing it with his own eyes David was still struggling with the concept.

For the time being at least, David decided, the best thing to do would be to keep the knowledge to himself.

* * *

They looked all over the city. In the usual criminal hangouts - the warehouse district and the rock cafe on the high street. The joke shop in the East End and the research section of the city library.

Everywhere came up blank. Nobody had seen Danziger. Nobody had heard anything of the Red Devil either, or if they had they weren’t willing to tell either of them about it.

“The truth of the business is obvious,” Charles said when they had a briefing meeting with Anderson and the police chief. “The Red Devil has kidnapped the editor of the City Globe for his own nefarious purposes.”

“What nefarious purposes might those be?” Keller asked, less than convinced, and Charles only gave him a withering look, the one that always put David in mind of a disappointed school teacher.

“If I knew that, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

“If only we knew where the Red Devil’s lair was,” Anderson sighed, gaze falling on the television set in the corner of the room, and the scrolling news feed which was full of updates on the Danziger case.

David swallowed thickly and rose slowly to his feet, soothing Charles' old fashioned sensibilities with a polite,

“Excuse me, I’ll be back shortly.”

He rode his bike over to the Globe offices, and this time the receptionist couldn’t do enough for him. Happily handed over the key to Danziger’s office, and offered to bring him up a cup of tea and a couple of biscuits to sustain him through a second sweep of the place.

David declined, politely, and hurried up to the top floor, glancing about him to check that nobody was watching. As soon as he was certain he was alone he took the picture from the wall and punched in the key code. The filing cabinet swung away from the wall, proof that it hadn’t all been some kind of strange hallucination, and David slipped behind it and down the stairwell.

He was almost to the bottom when he heard a soft groaning noise. He stopped dead, fishing in his utility belt for his torch of justice - then cursed when the damn thing refused to turn on, the batteries having run dead.

He had told Charles they ought to switch to an eco friendly option.

Shoving the torch back into his belt, he fumbled his cell phone out of his pocket instead. Charles was against carrying cell phones while in costume. Not because they might be dropped or stolen and used against them, but just because he couldn’t see the point in general and could scarcely do more than switch one on specifically.

David was glad he usually took it anyway though, and used it to light the narrow passageway leading in to the hidden office. There was a dark shape on the floor in front of him. A dark shape that moved slightly and groaned again, and when David cast the light across it he realized that it was Danziger, his leg twisted under him at an unnatural angle.

“You have no right to be down here!” Danziger warned, sounding less of a supervillain and more of a petulant child. “But,” he capitulated, face twisting into a grimace of pain, “seeing as you’re here, I need help getting up. My leg is broken.”

There was the implication, David just knew, that it was likely on the stress point from the tumble down another staircase, all those years ago.

David helped him up as painlessly as possible. Suggested that he get more help - an ambulance, Charles, or even one of the Red Devil’s henchmen - but Danziger shot each option down with derision.

“I don’t want anyone knowing about this place.”

“You seem pretty certain that I’m not going to reveal it,” David pointed out, and helped Danziger through into the office he had seen yesterday and to sit in a chair, needing to catch his own breath and order his thoughts. “I don’t know why that is.”

“Don’t you?” Danziger asked, and his gaze was so intent David had to look away.

“There’s a city wide manhunt for you. Nobody seemed concerned that the Red Devil hasn’t been sighted though.”

Danziger tensed up, awkward, and David looked around the room, gaze fixing on the notice board again, and the central photographs of him smiling.

“Why do you do it?”

“Why do you dress up as Justice Lad?”

“To do good. To make a difference. I don’t steal. I don’t write stories making fun of people.”

“I wasn’t making fun of you.”

David glared.

“Well, maybe just a little. You can do better. You ought to branch out on your own.”

“You ought to worry less about my career path, and more about how you’re going to lie your way out of this one,” David snapped defensively. “I'm a perfectly healthy weight too, in case you were wondering.”

He might be a good guy but he could hold a grudge with the best of them.

“I know,” Danziger said in a tone that made something in David's stomach flutter. Something that made him bite at the inside of his cheek to ensure he was glaring properly. Danziger looked away first and fell silent for a few moment. Raked a hand through his graying hair and sighed, before a slow smile curled across his face.

“I have an idea.”

* * *

_Our favorite caped crusader meted out justice of a different kind yesterday when the Red Devil was brought to heel. The villainous cad had kidnapped Nathan Danziger, long serving editor of the City Globe, in the hope of controlling the Globe’s award winning food critics page as part of his latest venture._

_Justice Lad saved the day when he found a flyer for a newly opened restaurant on Danziger’s desk, and uncovered the dastardly plot._

It was a little over the top, that went without saying, but Danziger was still recovering and the deputy editor was well known to be moonlighting as a famous romance novelist.

Still, it had all worked out well. The restaurant was actually a front for the Red Devil’s chief rival to the title of Metro City's most wanted criminal, and the police were so pleased to find quantities of stolen property in the cold store that they didn’t even complain about how he had ignored protocol and gone in gung ho to play the hero.

“That was some good work,” Charles said, breaking his reverie. “You really are a hero.”

“I’m not a hero,” David said in turn, cheeks blushing hotly. Charles had a knack for making him feel 16 years old all over again. “I was just doing what I’m trained to do. What your teaching has enabled me to do.”

Charles smiled softly.

“No, David you _ _are__ a hero. I want you to have this.”

David gaped as Charles took his hand and placed his badge, the insignia of the American Dream, into his palm.

“Charles you can’t - I mean, I’m not. You __can’t.__ ”

“I can,” Charles reassured. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I’m not getting any younger and, while I'll always love Metro City, there are things I want to do. Places I want to see.”

David swallowed back emotion. They had had their differences but Charles was still the hero. The guy he had looked up to all his life.

The man who had seen the latent potential in him all those years ago, and invested his time and energy into educating and training him. Who had taken him in and treated him as though he were his own son.

“How will I manage?” He asked plaintively, still not quite ready to believe it.

Charles just smiled at him.

“You’ll have a Justice Lad of your own to help you.”

* * *

_The American Dream and Justice Lad open new cyber crime resource center._

_“Cyber crime is the number one threat facing our police force, and it is an honor to open this new state of the art response unit.”_

_Police Chief Keller said, “I would like to thank Charles Leveson of LEV Inc for his generous donation, and the American Dream and Justice Lad for all their help in sourcing equipment and for their unfailing support.”_

David lowered the newspaper and smiled over at Ryan who grinned around his dinner, earning himself a glare from Martha. Ryan was a little over eager, needed to be reigned in occasionally, but he was a good lad.

A good Justice Lad.

They were helping people, making a difference, and even police chief Keller was coming around to them. The new commissioner was a fan too. The cyber crime unit had been her idea, and she had the drive and the energy to push it through from conception to realization.

Anderson and Charles had, to the surprise of just about everyone but themselves, gotten married not long after Charles’ announcement that he would be taking a more hands off approach at LEV Inc. She was standing for city mayor now, and Charles was running her campaign.

He was so visibly besotted with her that it made David’s own heart kind of ache.

Even if he wasn’t doing too badly himself in that direction. Had a standing date night on Tuesdays - crime permitting - and after a long night of do gooding it was a relief to unlock the door and be greeted by a haughty cat that wound its way around his legs.

To clamber into bed beside a warm body and be pulled into an embrace, sleepy kisses pressed to his face.

The Red Devil was still up to his old tricks, though less frequently than he had once been, and even Nathan Danziger at the City Globe was cutting them some slack.

“Your feet are cold,” Nathan complained when he got in that evening. “I hope that’s not a sign of your commitment to the cape.”

“So long as there are villains to be caught, the American Dream will be out there chasing them.”

“That so? It seems to me like you’ve already caught one.”

David only smiled and snuggled closer.

He liked to think they were both doing their roles justice.

**Author's Note:**

> As ever, feel free to chat / hit me with prompts over on Tumblr [@serenwib](http://serenwib.tumblr.com/) or Twitter [@falsteloj](https://twitter.com/falsteloj). :)


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